Google Spaces helps you share things with small groups
Apparently, Google+ refocusing on communities just wasn’t enough. Google has introduced Spaces, an app for Android, iOS and the web that’s designed solely for sharing experiences in small groups. All you have to do is start a topic, invite a few people (no, they don’t need Google+) and you’re off to the races — there’s a conversational view that makes sure you see whatever’s going on. Chrome, search and YouTube are built-in, so you don’t have to hop between apps to find a relevant story or video.
The app isn’t live as we write this (it arrives later on the 16th), so it’s hard to say how well it’ll work in practice. However, it’s clear that the folks in Mountain View believe that Google+ communities can only accomplish so much. They tend to revolve around larger groups, and it’s easy for someone’s thoughts to get lost in a sea of posts. Spaces is the antithesis of that: it’s for book clubs, developer meet-ups and any other close-knit community where every person’s input is valuable.
Source: Google Official Blog
Meizu hopes Indiegogo can fund its first US product
Meizu is a company most Americans likely haven’t heard of. But it’s actually one of the largest consumer electronic brands in China, having sold over 20 million smartphones last year. Its latest and greatest handheld is the Meizu Pro 6, which boasts a 5.2-inch Super AMOLED display, a 21-megapixel camera and a whopping 10-core processor. Now, the company has its sights set on the US market. But it’s not planning on introducing a phone here. Instead, it’s launching a wireless speaker. And it’s doing so, surprisingly enough, through crowdfunding site Indiegogo.
But before we get into why Meizu is doing this, let’s go over what the product is. The wireless speaker is called Gravity, and it’s designed to look as if it’s floating on air. Designed by Japanese designer Kosho Tsuboi, the speaker actually sits on top of a transparent block of acrylic, which at certain angles, looks as if it’s not there. The acrylic block is positioned off-center, which might make you concerned about the speaker tipping over, but Meizu has added enough weight so that it won’t. Stacked right atop that is an acrylic prism, which refracts a special floating display that disappears when not in use, adding to the illusion of transparency.
The overall speaker has a relatively small footprint (262mm x 58mm x 47mm), and though I don’t know its exact weight, it had a nice solid heft to it when I tried moving it around. This is definitely the kind of speaker you would leave somewhere to look good, rather than something you’d carry around from room to room. Seeing as it’s not battery-powered — you’ll need to plug it into the wall — it’s pretty obvious that this is not meant to be highly portable. Aside from the transparent acrylic, the speaker housing itself is metal, with a soft mesh fabric covering the front and rear grille. It’ll cost $200 at retail.
As for audio quality, Meizu says it’s worked with Dirac, a Swedish company specializing in acoustic engineering. It has custom speakers with “dual passive resonance membrane” for a stronger bass and is incorporated with Dirac’s proprietary “HD Sound” tech. You can set the speakers up over WiFi using the Gravity app, but if that’s too much of a hassle, you can also use it via Bluetooth or an AUX-in port. Unfortunately, the prototype I handled was a non-working model so I couldn’t test out the Gravity’s supposed audio properties.
In some ways, the Gravity is a return to Meizu’s roots; it started in 2003 as a manufacturer of MP3 players. “We used to be number one,” said Lola Wu, Meizu’s senior product and marketing manager. “A lot of young people in China used our products.” Then, the company shifted focus to making smartphones. It eventually got into a bit of a rivalry with Xiaomi, the other big smartphone maker in the region. Wu tells me that Meizu’s founder, Jack Wong, and Xiaomi’s founder, Lei Jun, used to be friends, but that their visions were different. Wong, she says, is more of a designer, while Jun is more of a businessman. “Our boss is always focused on design […] He wants everything to be perfect.”
The Gravity, then, is a symbol of Meizu’s heritage of design and music. Unlike smartphones that are disposed of every two years, Wu tells me that the Gravity is meant to be a piece of art. It’s purposefully design-focused and, as its Japanese designer is from a Buddhist monk background, it’s meant to invoke the spiritual with its minimalist look.
So why launch this in the US? Why not sell one of its many smartphones here instead? It’s partly because Meizu is well aware that its phones look far too similar to the iPhone in terms of design. “We know that,” Wu says, adding that it just wouldn’t provide enough differentiation. Further, the Meizu brand just isn’t as well-known stateside and might be seen as inferior. “There’s an idea that Made in China is a cheap product,” says Wu. “Nowadays that’s changed.” That’s partly why the company was so insistent on making the Gravity a premium device; to rid itself of that stigma.
But a key reason why Meizu chose to launch a wireless speaker in the US is due to the difference between US and Chinese markets. Wireless speakers like Sonos, Wu tells me, just aren’t popular in China, perhaps because the typical Chinese home doesn’t have multiple rooms. The US market, on the other hand, appears to have embraced high-end wireless speakers as a general concept from the likes of not just Sonos, but also Bose and JBL. That’s not to say the company won’t eventually sell the Gravity in China too, but it figured this was the company’s best shot at gaining a US audience.
As for the decision to go on Indiegogo, it’s clearly not because of the money; Meizu is a successful company that could very well have manufactured the product and sold it without issue. “It’s because we need suggestions!” says Wu. “We need feedback about the product. We want the pickiest market to tell us what they think.”
I have to say the acrylic blocks strike me as a touch tacky and a tiny bit impractical — I would feel a little more secure if the speaker laid flat on the table instead of being balanced on a block. Still, I do think it looks pretty cool with its “floating” design and there are probably people who are far more discerning than me who might like something as artistic as this.
So if you’re keen on checking out Meizu’s first-ever US product, check out Gravity’s Indiegogo page to find out more details about it as well as the history behind the design. Early bird backers can get it for $169 instead of the retail $199. Wu tells me that if the product gets enough funding, they might lower the price even further. Estimated delivery date is December 2016.
Source: Indiegogo
Google Play makes it easier to test Android apps
It’s not too hard to beta test an Android app, but the process still tends to involve jumping through a few hoops. You might need to visit the developer’s website, for instance, or join a community. Thankfully, it’s about to get downright trivial in the near future: Google is rolling out a Play Store update that lets you join (or leave) Android betas right from the regular app’s listing. Certain tests may ask you to sign up for a Google+ community first, but you won’t have to go scrounging for a beta-specific app entry or download an installer from a website.
The updated store will also let you know when you’re using a beta-only app (that is, there has never been a finished release). And you’re not writing regular reviews anymore — instead, you’re leaving private feedback for the developer. It’ll sadly take some time for the Google Play update to automatically reach your device, but Android Police is offering an install file if you just can’t wait to experiment with unfinished code.
Source: APKMirror, Android Police
John McAfee claims to have cracked secure WhatsApp messages
John McAfee is already many things — entrepreneur, presidential hopeful, alleged criminal. However, you might have to add one more item to that list: the co-discoverer of a potentially major Android security flaw. He and a team in Colorado claim to have found a hole in Google’s mobile platform that lets them read encrypted WhatsApp messages (and those from other services, for that matter), rendering its privacy safeguards pointless. McAfee is saying precious little about how the intrusion works, but he gave Cybersecurity Ventures enough details to suggest that the story might hold up.
LIFARS, which conducted forensics, notes that the trick didn’t involve getting root access to the phone, and that there were hints of both keyboard recording and spyware vulnerabilities. This could target an everyday Android phone, then, not just one that’s already compromised.
McAfee says he’s sharing the flaw after talking to Google. We’ve asked Google itself if it can shed more light on the claims and outline its plans for a fix (assuming one is needed). If his team really did find a way around encryption, though, this could represent a serious problem. Simply speaking, you couldn’t guarantee that a chat was private unless you knew that everyone was running a safe operating system.
Source: Cybersecurity Ventures
$60 gets you 6GB of mobile data on Verizon pre-paid plans
Verizon is bumping its pre-paid data allotments up. Folks on the $45, 1GB month-to-month plan will have an additional 2GB of mobile data available at their fingertips come May 15th, and the $60 plan jumps from 3GB of data to 6GB. Of course, that’s if you’re enrolled in auto-pay. If not? Each plan’s data drops by 1GB. The plans include unlimited texts to Canada and Mexico, but if you want to make unlimited calls to either of our immediate continental neighbors, you’ll have to pony up for the most expensive plan.
Via: The Verge
Source: Verizon
Google’s iOS keyboard is the GIF and emoji app of my dreams
I just deleted the Giphy app from my iPhone. This is notable because I adore GIFs. I find a deep, slightly perverse, pleasure in sending texts full of those little moving pictures to my loved ones, and the Giphy app streamlined my image-hunting process tenfold. But now, it’s gone from my home screen, deleted forever because I found something that makes texting with GIFs even easier. I found Gboard.
Let’s not get melodramatic here: Gboard is simply Google’s new iOS keyboard. It’s not an app that will change your life or make your surly traditionalist uncle see the true value of technology, but it’s a welcome addition to my own texting routine. Gboard features Google search right in the keyboard, plus the ability to hunt for emoji by name. There’s also the Glide Typing swipeable keyboard and, of course, GIF search.
The embedded Google search function is ridiculously handy. It brings browser searching straight to the keyboard, eliminating the process of closing the texting app, opening a browser, copying a link, closing the browser and finally pasting the information into a message. Instead, tap the G icon in the upper left corner of the keyboard and search right there for anything on the web, including weather reports, addresses, flight information and nearby cat cafes (hey, we said anything). Search results pop up in a single row of clickable cards; tap one and its headline and URL automatically populate in your message. If you want to add the actual card, just tap the card, tap the message field, hit “Paste” and voila!
Once you’ve searched for something, you’re able to toggle among web, image and GIF results via three icons under the row of cards. To add an image or GIF, tap the card you want and it’s automatically ready to be pasted, either as a boring static picture or a gloriously mobile, extra-short narrative experience. (Have I mentioned how much I love GIFs?)
But, that’s not the only way Gboard can add GIFs to texts. A small smiley face to the left of the spacebar brings up the standard iOS selection of emoji, plus the option to toggle to GIF search. Hit the “GIF” icon under those yellow smiley faces and search for whatever moving picture you’d like, or browse suggested searches such as “high five,” “thumbs up,” “shrug” and “mic drop.”
Even emoji are searchable in Gboard in a pleasantly natural way. Most icons seem to respond to a variety of terms — for example, searching for “Halloween” brings up a jack-o-lantern. The search even works with some misspellings and inaccurate predicted text. Not using the swipeable keyboard, I searched for “Halloweeb” and still received the happy little pumpkin, while “jack” brought up the pumpkin and the Union Jack. Using the swipeable keyboard, I accidentally searched for “punishing” and received a row of fists — and a jack-o-lantern at the very end.
Emoji search is a wonderful addition to my texting life, since I find scrolling through rows of vaguely sorted icons to be time-consuming and frustrating. Plus, Gboard suggests emoji even when you’re composing a text-only message. For example, I started asking my boyfriend if he wanted to get a burrito for lunch and the first suggested “word” under the message was the burrito emoji. We also messaged each other about butts for a while, which is when I realized the peach emoji actually represents a booty, not a vagina. The more you know, indeed.
Overall, the Glide Typing function is suitably responsive (this isn’t the first swipeable keyboard for iOS, after all), though I have to make sure the nail on my thumb doesn’t interfere with my actual swiping.
Gboard makes a lot of sense. I wouldn’t be surprised if it became the standard for keyboards in the near future — it’s a welcome upgrade based on how people actually send text messages. And GIFs. We can’t forget the GIFs.
Windows phones will finally let you log-in with a fingerprint
We’ve know for a while now that Windows 10 would support for alternative log-in options like fingerprint, facial and iris recognition. Thanks to Windows Hello, unlocking a phone with facial recognition is possible, but using a finger to access your device hasn’t been an option. Well, that’s about to change. At the WinHEC conference this week, Microsoft announced that support for fingerprint scanners will be part of a Windows 10 Mobile update this summer.
Of course, that software feature will need hardware to support it. HP’s Elite X3, a phone that doubles as a laptop, has a fingerprint scanner but we’ll have to wait and see if other device makers adopt the Windows Hello tool. Microsoft says while some OEMs have experience with fingerprint components from FPC and Synaptics, using scanners from other companies may take a bit more effort to work alongside Windows 10. The Anniversary Update that will deliver the feature is in testing now, and it should arrive in July for both desktop and mobile.
Via: MSPoweruser, The Verge
Source: WinHEC Presentation (PDF)
Brave browser now blocks scripts and ads on the desktop
Former Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich’s privacy-focused, ad-blocking browser has been quietly rolling out new features for desktop. What sets Brave apart from other browsers and ad blockers, was Eich’s promise that the browser would actually pay you back if you agreed to be shown ads from its own network.
The browser’s scheme rattled newspaper giants like the New York Times and Down Jones, which sent Brave a letter alleging the plan was copyright infringement. Brave responded by asserting they were not tampering with the publisher’s content and promised the in-house ad network would actually pay out a more favorable revenue share.
But that payment system and ad network hasn’t materialized yet, so what the desktop version does offer for now is a private, Chromium-based browser in a relatively clean-looking package (albeit with some gaps on the page). Script and ad-blocking is baked in by default in the latest version, which also catches up with the browser giants by adding spellcheck. And with a completely ad-free experience at the moment, it looks like nobody is getting paid just yet.
ISIS releases learning app to teach kids about tanks and rockets
A new Android app from the tech-savvy extremist group ISIS hopes to help out busy ISIS parents by teaching their kids to read and militarizing them at the same time. The app, called Huroof, was released via the Islamic State’s Telegram channel and includes games for learning the letters of the Islamic alphabet with militaristic vocabulary words like “tank” and “rocket.”
In addition to the alphabet flash cards, the app also includes learning songs reportedly loaded with jihadist terms and appealing, cartoonish animations. While the learning app isn’t the first from the Islamic State, Threat Matrix reports, but it is the first to be aimed at children. While the United States Military Cyber Command might be taking the Islamic State’s online threats more seriously these days, apparently no one predicted the group would go after the world’s youngest Android users.
The encrypted messaging app Telegram, for their part, has started cracking down on ISIS-related activity. Back in November of last year, the app claimed it had banned 78 channels in 12 languages allegedly tied to the group.
Everything you love will die, especially in tech
A little over a year ago, Microsoft bought beloved calendar app Sunrise. For the past 14 months or so, things have been more or less business as usual… at least for customers. But this week, the other shoe finally dropped: August 31st will be the last day that Sunrise exists as a standalone app. Sure, you could use Outlook, which by now shares some of the same DNA, but it’ll never be the same. Indeed, some of us here at Engadget are pretty heartbroken about it. Which got us thinking about all of the other apps and services that we loved and relied on that ended up being unceremoniously shuttered.
Sunrise
My life runs on Google Calendar. I use it everyday, not just for work meetings, but also to manage my personal life — everything from my gym schedule, hair appointments and dinners out with friends. But for years now, I’ve been unable to make Google Calendar play nice on my iPhone. The default iOS calendar just doesn’t seem to work with all of Google’s multiple shared calendars. This is especially true of the calendars we have on our corporate Google Apps account, which wouldn’t show up at all. A few years ago, someone suggested Sunrise to me as an alternative. And my life was saved.
Sunrise was beautiful. The UI made so much more sense. I loved the ability to just look at the week’s calendar at a glance, and I loved that I could integrate my personal and work calendars in a single interface. Sunrise really was the perfect Google Calendar app for me. What’s more, because Sunrise also worked on Android and the desktop, I could switch up my devices and still keep all my settings. Oh, and the integration with Google Maps was a godsend; it saved me from getting lost several times.
So when I heard Sunrise would be going away, my heart shattered. I know, it’s now been phased into the new Outlook app, but it just doesn’t look the same. I could also just use the recently launched Google Calendar app, but I find it sluggish (it takes forever for my calendars to sync) and the design is garish. It feels weird to say this about a calendar app, but Sunrise will be hard to replace. It was one of the few reliable constants in my life. I guess I’ll just have to make do with the default apps for now.
-Nicole Lee, Senior Editor
Hopstop
Why did Apple have to buy Hopstop? Don’t answer that. I know why they did: to help make their crappy maps app better. But man, what a shame. I first heard about Hopstop, the website offering subway directions, back in 2006 — a time when the web itself was still quaintly referred to as “new media.” Even as a lifelong New Yorker, I found the site useful: Though I have a good idea of which lines cover which areas, I haven’t committed the exact schedules to memory, nor am I always aware of service disruptions. Even now, I need something like this to figure out exactly how late I can sleep in on a Monday morning and still make the subway for my 6:30am workout class. (Hashtag humblebrag.) Obviously too, I need subway directions when I’m traveling strange cities, though back in 2006, Hopstop’s selection was admittedly more limited.
After Apple bought the service in 2013, I could no longer use the app on my Moto X. The standalone website has been shut down too, which is a bummer when I’m using a desktop machine. (Using Maps for OS X is annoying, since it’s slow to recalculate my route when I plug in custom arrival or departure times.) I’ve since switched to the iPhone 6, but even now, there’s no standalone app; just Apple Maps, with transit directions built in. That’s a shame, because even after all the improvements Apple has made to its once-terrible maps program, it’s still not my go-to. Worse still, the transit directions in Apple Maps seem to offer less detailed information than I was accustomed to in Hopstop proper, especially where train timetables are concerned.
Fortunately, as a famous man once said, good artists copy, and great artists steal. Today, in the year 2016, Google Maps has detailed transit directions of its own — and I don’t need an Android phone to access them.
-Dana Wollman, Managing Editor
Glitch
Most of the staff here at Engadget was pretty pleased when we switched to Slack for our work chats. It has so many features baked in that I’m not sure that any of us could ever go back. And yet, there are moments where I’m nostalgic for a world without Slack, because it would mean we’d still have Glitch. Glitch was a browser-based MMORPG that eschewed combat in favor of exploration, crafting and just generally being a nice person. It made mundane tasks like mining and farming irresistibly adorable.
It was also super weird: You were living inside a giant’s brain. But there was a subway. And you could milk butterflies. You got butter by shaking the milk. Eventually you’d get cheese? Don’t ask me to make sense of the game’s world or mechanics; I just enjoyed wandering around planting and harvesting crops, shaking chickens for grain and just amassing massive piles of odd virtual crap. Alas, it wasn’t exactly the sort of runaway success developer Tiny Speck needed to stay afloat. So, it shut the game down and shifted its focus to a chat program the team created while developing Glitch. And, given how well Slack has worked out I don’t blame the company at all. But man, there are times when I really, really miss milking butterflies.
-Kris Naudus, Senior Database Editor
Google Reader
Nary a day goes by that I don’t mourn the loss of my beloved Google Reader. Sure, there are countless alternatives with annoyingly similar names — Digg Reader, AOL Reader, Inoreader, Old Reader, (just) Reeder — but none of them have really captured my heart the way Google’s RSS app did. There was something elegant about its simplicity. It was reliable, fast and made it easy to keep up on the hundreds of sites in my feeds (at its peak, somewhere around 480). I knew all the keyboard shortcuts by heart and could plow through thousands of articles, opening the interesting ones to read later in a background tab, in mere minutes. It was all just muscle memory.
But, Google didn’t love Reader the way I (or the rest of its fans) did. In July 2013 it died for good. In the aftermath those previously mentioned alternatives scrambled to pick up the pieces. I took my business to Feedly, but honestly it’s never felt like more than a rebound. I could never love it the way I loved Google Reader. It left me out in the cold and I’ve never really gotten over it.
-Terrence O’Brien, Managing Editor
Carousel
I loved Dropbox’s Carousel. Its auto-upload function spirited my photos from my phone once I connected to WiFi, and the app interface had a tantalizing dial that you used to literally roll back in time through your photos. It was far more visually appealing than the original Dropbox photo upload option — and so very scrollable. I already paid for plenty of storage and often used the app for work-based photo sharing. This just brought my world of ramen photography and karaoke videos into the same cloud space.
Long before Facebook made flashback pics a plague on all of our newsfeeds, Carousel would corral weekly selections of your snapshots from yesteryear. It launched on Android and iOS in September 2014 but, by mid 2015, Dropbox was already planning a funeral. The company said it was putting its energy into sharing and collaboration features in the primary app, as well as newer work collaboration-based apps like Paper. Dropbox could have left Carousel to stand on its own. It was less serious, less business-y than the company’s main app.
Whatever Dropbox’s reasons for ending the photosharing fun-fair, there’s was one rival that probably made the decision to pull the plug easier: Google Photos.
It offered free unlimited (with strings attached) photo storage, automagically backed up photos to your Google account, and crammed in a ton of sharing features that were easy to access — even on an iPhone.
Basically, it became a better Carousel. It pulled in geotag data, face recognition and other machine learning tricks to group your photos together. It wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty on-point. I didn’t have to scroll through my iPhone camera roll to find pics of my reclusive brother, Google Photo automatically pulled them all together. It would also auto-create gifs of burst photo sets.
They say imitation is the highest form of flattery. Well, Carousel was flattered to death.
-Mat Smith, Senior Editor
AIVAnet 